Congratulations to Mart Blöndal on the Title of Managing Associate

We are pleased to congratulate our experienced colleague on his new title! Mart Blöndal will now hold the role of Managing Associate. We asked him about his thoughts and goals related to the new position.

In which field of law are you currently working?

Today, my main focus areas are state aid, energy, and competition law. These three areas create a clear synergy, which allows us to offer legal services to clients in a broader and more integrated way than traditionally done.

What has your journey to this new title been like?

The journey has, in line with my wishes, been full of challenges and — more importantly — interesting. The choice of field has ultimately been driven by my own interest in both my work and the sectors I work with. On the one hand, I have always been intrigued by combining economics and law (i.e. state aid and competition law), and on the other, the natural sciences (including how the energy system operates). My current combination of practice areas enables exactly this kind of cross-disciplinary work.

In addition to my own interests, the foundation of this journey has been the large number of people I’ve met throughout my career, who — in nearly every conversation — have shared their knowledge with me. These people definitely include our clients, but also various cooperation partners with whom we’ve worked on different projects.

What have been the biggest challenges in your career?

Without a doubt, the biggest challenge has been balancing work and personal life. Since the fields I work in are ones I’m personally interested in, I often find myself wanting to read a scientific article or news piece even outside of working hours. This, in turn, can spark a new idea related to a client matter, which quite quickly leads to jotting down a thought in my calendar and working on it.

At the same time, since this usually replaces some unproductive activity, I don’t see it as too much of a loss.

What would you still like to do in your field?

The answer is simple — the same thing I’ve been doing, just better. A few years ago, the European Commission described Facebook’s data handling as a self-reinforcing loop: the more data Facebook had, the better it could offer advertisements, and the better it offered ads, the more data it collected. Very simply put, the goal is the same. With every project, we gain more experience and can, in turn, advise our clients even better.